A Promise

Chapter Two: The Dawn Will Come Anyway

The moon was different tonight.

Fili wasn't as well read about the ways of the world as the older dwarves in Balin's tutelage. The few young dams, a rarity compared to the number of dwarrows, took to lessons of the night sky as if it were second nature. Fili struggled with the old language those tomes were written in, and Kili—well, his brother didn't know how to write his own name yet. Despite all of this, when he looked up through the little window in their room, he could see the moon drifting in the sky and was drawn to it. Full and eternal, free from the cover of clouds.
No, Fili thought as he moved the rough furs from over him and shifted to the edge of the bed. This was like no moon he had ever seen before.

Uncle Thorin was here. He could hear the deep husk of his voice reverberating through the floorboards below them as he spoke. Fili couldn't remember the last time he had seen Thorin and a small part of him wanted to rush down and hug him as soon as he heard the door. But they had been in trouble once already, he doubted Papa would convince Mama to be lenient a second time.
It was snowing ever so slightly, he could see little snowflakes drifting down and the moonlight caused them to cast shadows across the worn floorboards of their abode. He hoped for more snow, but Mama did not. Whenever the snow came Mama would be far easier to cross. She'd talk of boring things like firewood and blankets and that 'the windows don't keep the weather out as well as you think they do, Vili'.
Fili didn't see the fuss. Snow meant fun. It meant snowballs and time with Papa in the forest as he chopped wood. It meant burying his brother in a snow bank—although in hindsight when he did that last year Kili had fallen ill.

The floorboards were cold when he lowered himself from the bed, that chill stabbed the soles of his feet as he traversed their bedroom expertly, knowing full well which board creaked, which of them could be heard downstairs. Climbing up the chests of clothes was the next task at hand, but that did not give him pause. In no time, he had clambered his way to the window sill. To the humans this home was made for, it would not have been high at all. But to an infant dwarf, that window stretched up at a dizzying height. With a little huff of exertion, Fili heaved himself up onto the ledge and tried to angle himself correctly so he could sit, leaning his back against the edge of the sill.
This was a far better view of the night sky than the one from his bed, and he smiled to himself in the darkness as he gazed up.

A slightly throaty cough broke his concentration and Fili looked down at the bed quickly. Kili had rolled onto his back, his arms spread at his sides. His dark hair was in his eyes, but he was too deep in sleep to care. Typical, Fili thought, looking away once more when he was quite sure Kili still slept.
He always took up all the space—

"No! I will not hear another word on the matter!"

The shout from downstairs had startled him to the point where he had almost fallen from his spot. It had certainly sounded like his mother. A deep-rooted panic set into Fili's core when he heard her feet on the stairs. Would he have the time to make it down from the window and into the bed before she reached their door? He certainly doubted it. With an anxious inhale, Fili twisted, braced his hands on the wooden ledge and tried to lower his legs onto the stacked chests.
His mother was on the landing now. Fili remained dangling a few inches above the chests, his face screwed up as he awaited the inevitable. But his mother never opened their chamber door, she walked right on by towards her own chamber; for the briefest second Fili thought he heard her crying after the door was shut.

Silence.

Fili slowly pressed the soles of his feet down onto the chests and instinctively looked over his shoulder. Kili slept on, as if the shouting and creaking floorboards had never happened. Fili didn't think. His little mind did not allow for the potential of consequences, not when his mother sounded upset. He opened the bedroom door ever so slightly his eyes fixed to his brother for any sign of movement. If Kili woke up, if Kili cried like last time, he'd have another sore ear to remember from Dis. The lanterns on the landing cast a little bar of light across Kili's face. For a heart-stopping moment, Fili saw his brother's expression crumple and he held his breath, only to exhale quietly in relief when Kili turned over in bed.